Just at that time there was some uncommonly deadly sniping going on, and any figure that was seen even for a fraction of time was a certain target. The sniper himself was a specially chosen German, and he had as a companion and look-out a smart chap with field-glasses, to sweep the countryside and report to the sniper anything promising that he saw in the way of a target. Working in pairs like this, the snipers were able to pick off the two majors as they walked up and down directing and encouraging us. They were shot, and, as far as we could tell, killed instantly. We felt their loss very greatly. Major Stares had very much endeared himself to his men, and he was a great favourite in South Africa before the war began. We were all eager to get to the front, of course, and were constantly talking about what we should do, and wondering what would happen when we met the Germans. The major was never tired of explaining what we ought to do in tight and dangerous corners, and asking us what _we_ should do. I have known him stop us in the street to ask us these questions, so keen and anxious was he for our welfare. The second day of the fighting passed and the third came. Still we held on, but it became clear that we were too hopelessly outnumbered to hope for complete success at the time, and so we were forced to leave the trenches. Withdrawing again, we took up positions in farmhouses and woods and any other places that gave shelter. All the time there was a killing fire upon us, and it happened that entire bodies of men would be wiped out in a few moments. A party of the Warwicks got into a wood near us, and they had no sooner taken shelter than the German gunners got the range of them, shelled them, and killed nearly all of them. There was not a regiment of the Glorious Seventh that had not suffered terribly in the advance during the three days’ fateful fighting. The Bedfords had lost, all told, about 600, and it was a mere skeleton of the battalion that formed up when the roll was called. But there was one pleasant surprise for me, and that was meeting again with Lance-Corporal Perry. We had lost sight of each other in the hand-to-hand fighting with the Prussian Guard, and met again when we were reorganised at an old château; and very thankful we were to compare notes, especially as each of us thought that the other was a dead man. There were a good many cases of soldiers turning up who were supposed to be either killed or wounded, or, what is worse, missing. In the inevitable disorder and confusion of such a battle they had got separated from their own regiments and had joined others; but they turned up in due course in their right places.